2) Now that I know what to look for, I've located more and more of Ed's mistakes. Not only does this make me giggle, but it serves to remind me that I really do know all of this literature pretty well. As graduate students are rarely granted a sense of empowerment, particularly where full-fledged PhDs are concerned, I'm pretty happy.

3) While looking for something else I had a huge Eureka Moment, an instant in which a vague hunch became something that I could now argue with conviction, and I had the evidence to prove it. Ten minutes later I had another.

4) When I knocked over my can of diet coke, it spilled on my machine washable sweatshirt, not the library books or dissertation notes or printed out suggestions from my advisor (may he live forever) or the carpet or the...